


Define 'worse'

by Ryxl



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor: The Dark World - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Odin's A+ Parenting, the "trial" of Loki, very angry very bitter Loki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-16
Updated: 2013-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-04 20:54:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1085587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ryxl/pseuds/Ryxl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki-centric unpacking of the "trial" scene to establish where he's coming from in later scenes. One-shot, although there may be an unpacking of said later scenes in the future. This is a very angry, very bitter Loki who smiles when he says "When do we start?" because he's already imagining Asgard in flames.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Define 'worse'

Loki strode down the hall nonchalantly, to all appearances unbothered by the wary guards following him, the chains held by angrily fearful warriors, the shackles that chimed ominously at every step. That his hands were secured by thick manacles seemed to escape him entirely, and the weight of the heavy collar connecting them might as well have been a silken scarf for all the heed the younger prince of Asgard paid to it. His pale gaze was fixed straight ahead, although whether he truly saw Odin’s throne or merely contemplated some inscrutable quandary as he walked was debatable. Certainly, he showed none of the emotions one might have expected – hatred, perhaps, or fear, or cringing hope. No one would guess what it was he truly felt. As Loki walked, he kept his expression carefully blank so that his malicious glee did not show. Always, he had been overlooked. Ignored for Thor’s brash prowess, his own talents brushed off or cast aside. No one was ignoring him now, no one dared disdain his talents or brush aside that he, perhaps even more than the man he called brother, was a force to be reckoned with.

The taste of respect was a heady draught indeed, made all the sweeter by the copious amounts of fear that flavored it. At last, all eyes were upon Loki and every heart whispered terror for what he could accomplish if he only set his mind to it. Every link in the chains that hung heavy around his hips, every metallic chime of the shackles, every rune carved into the manacles, every guard’s racing heartbeat and trembling breath proclaimed his might for all to see for, even restrained as he was, no one was truly confident that he had been made harmless. Weighted but unbowed, battered but unbroken, the lost prince of Asgard strode towards the throne like a monarch on a state visit and swallowed both amusement and rage.

That it had been Mother to discover that he still lived through her scrying had not been a surprise. Odin – _He’s not my father, he’s not my father_ – had made his opinion crystal clear on the broken end of the Rainbow Bridge, even if it had taken Loki long, pain-filled months to accept that a thousand years of being a good son, of trying to live up to Odin’s exacting standards, could be washed away as though they had never existed by those three cursed syllables: No, Loki. Or, perhaps they had never existed at all, just another layer of the elaborate lie that had been woven around him since the day he’d been stolen away from Jotunheim, another weapon to serve the Allfather or be locked away until such time as Asgard had use for him.

Locked away…Loki’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly. Odin had no cause to keep him alive, and every reason to punish his offenses with death – unless he was given one. How often had he or Thor been denied something they wanted in the heat of Odin’s wrath? No doubt Mother had begged for his life, as surely as she must have hurried to inform him that his adopted son had not died like an obedient child should have. How hard had she begged, wheedled, nagged until her husband had relented and sent Thor after him as a pretense for retrieving the Cube? No, Loki was willing to bet the only thing he had left – his life – on Odin denying him anything he asked for out of sheer perversity.

“Loki…”

Right on cue; it almost made him smile, this familiar song and dance. The woman who had raised him, hugged him, comforted him, taught him the ways of magic, fretted over him without fail, and always supported Odin – _He’s not my father, he’s not my father_ – over him. This would be no different. Why had it taken him so long to see?

“Hello, Mother,” he said with false warmth. “Have I made you proud?”

Like magic, her worry dissolved into discreet disapproval. “Please, don’t make this worse.”

Worse for whom, he wondered. Had the Allfather threatened his beloved wife with dire consequences should her wayward son misbehave? Did she even know that her husband had all but sanctioned his unsuccessful attempt at hurling himself to his doom? Probably not, and it made his words sharper than they otherwise might have been. “Define worse.”

For just a moment, fear flashed in her eyes before Odin – _He’s not my father, he’s not my father_ – interrupted, “Enough!” Just a moment, but that was all Loki needed to confirm that no amount of mouthing praises or insincere apology would win him even the slightest measure of leniency.

“I will speak to the prisoner alone,” Odin continued mildly, as though this were some minor trifling matter.

Loki watched as the woman he still thought of as _Mother_ walked swiftly from the hall, the tempo of her steps declaring her agitation. Unsurprisingly, the guards made no motion to leave. Once she was out of earshot, the fallen prince turned his attention once again to the throne – and the man sitting upon it. He took two steps, chin raised, more to emphasize the array of guards and chains than to truly approach like a lawful subject of Asgard, and when he stood at attention it was with a deliberate clashing of one shackle against the other, the harsh ring of metal on metal echoing back from the far corners of the chamber. He laughed as the echoes died, mocking the severity of the situation with a smile and an innocuous gesture that would have been spreading his hands were it not for the manacles that prevented them from spreading.

“I really don’t see what all the fuss is about,” he said with false levity.

“Do you not, truly, feel the gravity of your crimes?” That was Odin’s lecture voice; good. Whatever pompous announcement he’d intended to start with had been diverted. He was reacting, not controlling. Loki swallowed his broad smile as the Allfather continued, “Wherever you go, there is war, ruin, and death.”

The accusation rolled off of Loki’s determination without so much as a scratch. How often had Thor left ruin and death in his wake? And who was it that stopped the war his brother the golden child had started on Jotunheim? Ah, but that didn’t count – the Jotuns are monsters, after all. It must be Midgard, then, that he was ostensibly being held accountable for crimes against.

“I went down to Midgard to rule the people of Earth as a benevolent god.” Loki smiled, his tone not so much softening as becoming more subtly sharp. “Just like you.”

If his guess was correct, Odin would refute the comparison, unwilling to allow the scapegoat even the tiniest victory. If his guess was correct, Loki was the one pulling the strings in this little confrontation, the might of the Allfather nullified by his own ego.

“We are not gods,” Odin chided as though correcting a small child. “We’re born, we live, we die, just as humans do.”

Loki nodded in a show of reluctantly conceding the point. “Give or take five thousand years.” His lips tried to twist of their own accord into an expression of victory, and with some effort he reined them in. _He was_ in control, not the man who once claimed to be his father!

There was nothing Odin could say to refute that comparison, so instead he aimed a verbal shot at what he imagined was a chink in Loki’s armor. “All this because Loki desires a throne,” he said condescendingly.

“It is my birthright!” he shot back immediately, needled despite himself. For all that he had never actually wanted the throne of Asgard, he had been raised with the undeniable expectation that he would be a king some day, will he or nil he. Ah, but he was the scapegoat, the monster parents tell their children about at night, and he could never be right. How would the mighty Allfather explain Loki being wrong on such a clear-cut issue?

“Your birthright,” Odin shouted, leaning forward and cutting the word off as though burying it to the hilt in his supposed son’s chest, “was to die! As a child,” the Allfather continued in a more gentle tone.

Loki kept his expression blank through force of will, although he blinked several times in surprise. That was it, then? He was supposed to just accept that a thousand years of being held up to kingly standards had never happened? Had Odin always been this obviously unbalanced, Loki wondered, or had the last two years opened his eyes to blatant hypocrisy?

After the space of a breath, Odin went on. “Cast out onto a frozen rock. If I had not taken you in,” he explained as though it were the most reasonable thing in the Nine Realms, “you would not be here now to hate me.”

That was a perfect opening if ever Loki had seen one, and he stepped forward into it without hesitation. “If I’m for the axe,” he said in a tone just shy of taunting, “then for mercy’s sake, just…swing it. It’s not that I don’t love our little talks,” he went on, a distinct note of sneering disdain staining the words, “it’s just…” A pause, held just a breath too long, driving the insult home. “I _don’t_ love them.”

Was it wise to invite execution? Perhaps not for the average person, but he wasn’t average. He was Loki, the disgraced prince of Asgard, the cuckoo in the nest, the scapegoat who could never be right. By inviting death, he had – if Odin had been successfully goaded – ensured that such a fate was not to be his.

“Frigga is the only reason you’re still alive and you will never see her again.” The words were calm, emotionless, a statement of fact delivered almost without thought that made Loki sway slightly. Had he bought his life at the cost of his mother’s? “You will spend the rest of your days in the dungeon,” Odin finished, and the guards pulled obediently at the chains in recognition of this dismissal.

Loki allowed himself to be walked backwards for a few steps, mind working furiously. Mother would be forbidden from seeing him? Better than execution in his stead. “And what of Thor?” he asked. Then, remembering that Odin – _He’s not my father, he’s not my father_ – would deny anything he thought Loki wanted, he hurried on, “You’ll make that witless oaf king while I rot in chains?”

“Thor must strive to undo the damage you have done. He will bring order to the Nine Realms and then, yes, he will be king.”

The accusation of single-handedly bringing chaos and war to the Nine Realms was dismissed instantly, a blatant falsehood not worth even a moment’s thought, and Loki turned his mind to more important matters. Thor would be king. All of his machinations, all of his suffering, would not be for nothing. Satisfied and more than a little relieved, Loki allowed himself to be manhandled from the hall. Dungeons could be escaped from. Loopholes could be found. The important part was that he was not on his way to an execution. He would live, he would take whatever his well-intentioned but ineffective mother could provide him, and eventually he would again walk free even if he had to wait decades for the Allfather to step down. Thor would be king, and hope sprang ever eternal in his big, oblivious heart. Locked up he might be until such time as Asgard had use of him, but Loki _would_ be free again. He had only to bide his time, and show his brother what he wanted to see.


End file.
